This album represents escape and freedom, and musically it shows it. Paul McCartney wanted to make this album in an exotic location, so most of it was recorded in poor quality, and the conditions in Nigeria at the time were tense. To make matters worse, the drummer Denny Seiwell and guitarist Henry McCullough left the group shortly before, leaving McCartney alone with just his wife Linda and Denny Laine to record. McCartney played bass, drums, percussion and most of the lead guitar parts. Once again, to make matters worse, the McCartneys were robbed at knifepoint, losing a bag of song lyrics and demo tapes. Regardless of the struggles to finish this album, "Band On The Run" is one of the most renowned albums of the time, making it onto Rolling Stone's "Greatest Albums Of All Time" list.
This album is full of guitar riffs that balance between driving and agile, soaring synths, orchestral and cinematic movements, and poetic lyrics. McCartney is truly one of the greatest song writers of all time, and he proves it here after a few albums post the separation of The Beatles.
When you think of Queen, you think of Night At The Opera. This has some of Queen's most famous songs like, You're My Best Friend, Love Of My Life, and of course Bohemian Rhapsody. This was recorded at one of the lowest points of Queen's history after being swindled out of most of their previous album's earnings. After leaving their previous studio, Queen found themselves recording in several different studios and experimenting with multitrack recording and subsequentially recording their most expensive album at that point in their run.
This album experiments with several different musical genres such as ballads, music hall, sea shanties, Dixieland, hard rock, and progressive rock influences. It also is the genesis of a lot of production techniques that would go on to influence the mainline production of music. I specifically love the early tape delay effect on Frieddie's vocal on The Prophet's Song.
My favorites that I've never heard before are The Prophet's Song, '39, and Seaside Rendezvous. Great album all together!
This is a very cool album. I only associate Arctic Monkeys with the infamous guitar riff from Do I Wann Know?, so I was very surprised by the sound coming from this album. Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not was the debut album from the Arctic Monkeys which garnered critical acclaim from the UK, winning Best British Album at the Brit Awards and being nominated for a Grammy for Best Alternative Album. This group had several albums before this one, however they were copied and given away at the band's concerts on CD. They were big in the British youth scene and this album reflects that.
Musically, this album is a melding of indie rock, garage rock, post-punk revival, punk rock, and alternative rock. It is emblematic of the British nightlife, including lyricism surrounding clubbing and pub culture, and romance from the perspective of young Northerners. This has never been my style of music, but nonetheless, there are some really solid tunes in here. The most popular of which were "I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor" and "When the Sun Goes Down." My personal favorites were "Mardy Bum" and "A Certain Romance."
I have never heard of Tom Waits or this album, but I was definitely surprised by it. Based on the release date, album cover and title, "Rain Dogs," and the previous albums I listened to, I was expecting something a little more rock heavy and alternative. What I found was a mixture of old dirty blues, sea shanties, and a whole lot of other influences. There is a lot of musical competence here, but I found myself most shocked with the fact that I couldn't explain clearly what the sound of these songs were. These songs give you more of a feeling rather than a thought if that makes sense. Also, every song I heard reminded me of the seen in Shrek 2 where the king goes to the Poison Apple to find a bounty hunter. Captain Hook is playing a song when he walks in. I was shocked when I found that it was indeed Tom Waits playing/singing in that scene. Just a fun fact. My favorites were "Time," "Gun Street Girls," and "Downtown Train."
Great album and great vibe. Bowie really is something special. This is one of the earliest albums I've listened to, and you can tell that he's limited a little bit. By that I mean this album doesn't have a laser vibe, but more a mellow, psychedelic vibe.
Very interesting sound, but I'm not going to make it through this one, y'all.